I don't despise 'Don Quixote,' but it is a book I don't... get. I'll have to come back it. Maybe there'll be a gateway story that opens it up for me; that happened for me with 'Paradise Lost' and the 'His Dark Materials' trilogy.
I was a real mess at school. I got a bit of a reputation for being the weird girl: the girl who'd go silent randomly and just kind of write down replies to people's questions in a book.
I get angry about stuff, I get very emotionally intense about stuff and that's how I get it out - with books, with the band, on my own onstage, but it's always kind of a wail.
But my estimates, for instance, based upon book information, were simply ridiculous, fanciful images of African attractions were soon dissipated, anticipated pleasures vanished, and all crude ideas began to resolve themselves into shape.
Though I enjoy the occasional eBook from time to time, I will only stop reading books printed on paper when they pry them from my cold, dead, withered hands, and even then, they will be hard pressed to take them from me.
I don't have many friends. It's not because I'm a misanthrope. It's because I'm reserved. I'm self-contained. I get all my adventures in my head when I'm writing my books.
I'd always liked to read, but when I picked up books I wasn't getting the same kind of excitement from them that I was from going out clubbing. I wanted to get the same kind of feel.
No book can be written till it wants to be written, till it shouts to be written, and raises up a persistent din in the writer's head. And then, if you want peace, you just have to pull it out and freeze it in print. Nothing less would do.
There are times when I think that the ideal library is composed solely of reference books. They are like understanding friends—always ready to meet your mood, always ready to change the subject when you have had enough of this or that.
I don't know how Frank presented the old Mothers, since I never read the book. There might be some opinions on what he said, but I - or anyone else - could not make any corrections to anything Frank did.
When I settled to writing seriously, which would be in my 30s, I did expect to be published eventually, but my aspirations weren't very high. A published book and a few appreciative readers was my idea of heaven.
I have this fantasy. I'm walking past a bookshop and I click my fingers and all my books go blank. So I can start again and get it right.
I read books more than I go out. As a matter of fact, I get a little concerned about some of my anti-social habits. I will choose a night with Somerset Maugham or Russell Banks over a crowded bar any day.
At a Boston signing, someone from the audience asked why I was so obsessed with furniture in my books. The question rattled around in my head. I had no idea that I was obsessed with furniture.
I turn to Mrs. Kasperek; this feels urgent to me. "Do you know what Caliban says when he wants to take away Prospero's magic? 'Remember, first to possess his books; for without them he's but a sot.
I have like 250 letters that I have to whittle it down to 150. Only then do you have the whole overview of a book. When it was finally edited, at least my take was, everybody's lying. You know?
I would like to write a book that wasn't so violent and weird, but I just don't think I can do that with my talent. I don't think it would come off.
I was hugely formed by stories I was told as a child whether that was in a book, the cinema, theatre or television and probably television more than any medium is what influenced me as a child and formed my response to literature, story-telling and, ...
It was true; books had saved me in my home remodeling projects, but they fell short in teaching me how to trust my instincts, and how to stop thinking with my educated brain and more with my kneecaps and butt cheeks.
Books open and broaden our minds allowing us to challenge ourselves to become more than we are, by setting positive goals for ourselves, and overcoming doubts about our ability to receive the education we want to achieve.
There are two books that impressed me when I was very young. One was 'The Adventures of Augie March' - the idea of having something so generous, and so adventurous and improvisatory. The other was 'The U.S.A. Trilogy,' by John Dos Passos.
